Exploring Herbertstown

The 3rd and 4th class have been very busy for the past 2 weeks collecting and presenting their group work projects on Herbertstown. We found out some really interesting facts about our local area, carefully drew maps of the main street and even made some models of different parts of the village! The projects are now on display in the school corridor – feel free to have a look when passing.

Herbertstown became a mini-Cape Canaveral on Thursday with the launch of 10 bottle rockets!

To celebrate Space Week, the fifth and sixth class pupils designed and created bottle rockets in anticipation of Thursday’s launch date. The pupils had studied the space race earlier in the week and some of the designs took on an ‘Apollo’ theme. Others took a more original approach. In all, 10 groups created rockets. The rockets were crafted using a 2 litre drinks bottle which was then adapted to meet the design of each group.

Here’s the science bit:

The rockets need to be half filled with water before a hose is fixed to them. Air is pumped into the bottle until the air pressure inside the bottle becomes too great. This pressure forces the bottle’s cap to release and the force of the escaping air & water helps the rocket to beat gravity and take flight.

On Thursday, members of third and fourth class were asked to give each rocket a score based on its design and then its performance in flight. The entire school came out to watch each rocket being launched and there was great excitement at each ‘lift off’! Congratulations to Group 1, who had the best overall score for their rocket.

Pictiúirí

Herberstown NS, Herberstown, Co. Limerick at this years RDS Primary Science Fair Limerick which will see over 3000 primary school students from all over the country exhibit theirSTEM investigations at Mary Immaculate College. Between the three venues of Limerick, Dublin and Belfast there will be over 7000 participants in 2018. Photo: Oisin McHugh True Media